Dragon Dreams
Dusty Lynn Holloway
Genre(s): Dragons, Fantasy, Romance
Published: March 4th 2015
Pages: 420
Rating: 1 star

“A prophecy of murder.

An elf hunted by dragons.

One man who risks everything to save her.

Nachal is a human that should not be having prophetic Dragon Dreams. But he does. Every night he dreams of an elf running through flames, trying in vain to outrun the Rebel Dragon Obsidian. Every night he sees her fall. Sees her eyes close. Feels her heart as it slows, and then stops. Every night, through the connection of the dream, he dies with her. It's a spiral that he can't control, and it's slowly driving him insane.

Auri is an elf raised by a powerful human king not of her own blood. Left behind by the mother who perished far from the elven isle El`dell, she seeks to forge her life among the humans. Her journey takes her to the land of her heritage. To a place that holds both a haunting betrayal, and a miracle that just might save her life.

Together, they become embroiled in a conspiracy where destinies are intertwined, love is born in the fallout of ultimate sacrifice, and the only path to victory lies through the searing flames of dragon fire.”

A copy of this book was provided by the author in exchange for an honest review

Dragon Dreams doesn’t start out like the first book in a series; the terminology and lack of explanations feels more like jumping into the middle of an ongoing series. It was a little overwhelming to me and it set the tone for the rest of the book: boredom and confusion.

I’m not one who likes information to be dumped all at once, but I also don’t like being kept waiting for answers when it comes to fantasy. It’s a very fine balance and I feel that this didn’t get it quite right. It made a valiant effort, as things did start to be explained in chapter four, but they weren’t the explanations I was after. I wanted to know more about Nachal and why he was having the dreams, and why Auri was so important – not about the dragon war that I hadn’t even registered as important.

Things just felt a little all over the place and unrefined to me. Like the ideas were all there but the execution needed work and things just needed more thought put into them. Everything came across as trying too hard to be high fantasy, when in reality it was falling short. A map or even a glossary would have helped to clear things up and provide a point of reference. Whether I missed out on these features due to reading in e-book form, I don’t know, but context would have greatly improved Dragon Dreams.

I did, however, like the description of people and places. It painted a good picture in my head and was in-depth without becoming Lord of the Rings boring. Although, that being said, the writing style as a whole wasn’t to my taste and I was confused by the way certain things were worded. Some word choices also felt out of place and contradictory to how I perceived characters – they’d come across as shy and timid in their dialogue, yet annoyed in their actions, for example. Sections of dialogue were also unclear and confusing, even when I read them back multiple times. To me, the narration felt jumpy and seemed to flit between the present and exchanges that had happened a few pages back – and that I hadn’t fully absorbed.

As for the dragons, they were… interesting. I’ve read about dragons with the ability to shapeshift and maintain human forms before, in Seraphina by Rachel Hartman, and while not what I look for in dragons, it worked. The dragons in Dragon Dreams, though, seemed to take a back seat and didn’t catch my attention when they were present, mostly because I was very confused about them. I never got a sense that they had been fully explained to me as a reader. When I read the synopsis I was expecting actual dragons, à la Daenerys’ in A Song of Ice and Fire. I would have preferred that, in all honesty.

All in all, this didn’t meet the expectations I had for it and I wound up not enjoying it. The potential was there, but it needs more work and refinement. And also a lot less romance, but that’s just a personal preference.

Dusty Lynn Holloway and her work can be found at...
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Book Review: The Ice Dragon by George R.R. Martin

The Ice Dragon
George R.R. Martin
Genre(s): Dragons, Fantasy, Young adult
Published: December 1st 2014
Pages: 128
Rating: 5 stars

“In the world of A Song of Ice and Fire the ice dragon was a creature of legend and fear, for no man had ever tamed one. When it flew overhead, it left in its wake desolate cold and frozen land. But Adara was not afraid. For Adara was a winter child, born during the worst freeze that anyone, even the Old Ones, could remember. 

Adara could not remember the first time she had seen the ice dragon. It seemed that it had always been in her life, glimpsed from afar as she played in the frigid snow long after the other children had fled the cold. In her fourth year she touched it, and in her fifth year she rode upon its broad, chilled back for the first time. Then, in her seventh year, on a calm summer day, fiery dragons from the North swooped down upon the peaceful farm that was Adara's home. 

And only a winter child-and the ice dragon who loved her-could save her world from utter destruction.”

Dragons, George R.R. Martin, and great illustrations? I was sold on this book before I ever picked it up. So sold, in fact, I never even checked the price of it before I decided I was going to buy it. I just had to have a copy in my hands.

Martin delivers, yet again, a fantastic story set in the richly detailed and immersive world of Westeros (a fact I did not know going in to this as I didn't read the blurb, but it makes it ten times as wonderful knowing it's set in the same world as Daenerys and Sansa and all my other favourites). As a fan of ASOIAF, I'll take anything I can get while waiting for the next book, and this was fantastic.

While I didn't really think it was connected to the main series, I liked that it was set in a familiar world as it made getting into it a lot easier, and I did feel like it gave a but more padding to the creation. If multiple stories can be spun from one idea, then it must be great. And the fact that this so heavily featured dragons - my favourite fantastical creatures, both in and out of Martin's world - made it that much more interesting to read.

The Ice Dragon is a good entry point to the world of Ice and Fire, even though there is no direct link between them, such as characters. It is an easy story to follow, made better by the stunning illustrations from Luis Royo, with depth to it that should be appreciated by all fantasy fans, young or old.

Book Review: Seraphina by Rachel Hartman

Seraphina
Rachel Hartman
Genre(s): dragons, fantasy, young adult
Published: January 1st 2012
Pages: 369
Rating: 4 stars

“Four decades of peace have done little to ease the mistrust between humans and dragons in the kingdom of Goredd. Folding themselves into human shape, dragons attend court as ambassadors, and lend their rational, mathematical minds to universities as scholars and teachers. As the treaty's anniversary draws near, however, tensions are high.

Seraphina Dombegh has reason to fear both sides. An unusually gifted musician, she joins the court just as a member of the royal family is murdered—in suspiciously draconian fashion. Seraphina is drawn into the investigation, partnering with the captain of the Queen's Guard, the dangerously perceptive Prince Lucian Kiggs. While they begin to uncover hints of a sinister plot to destroy the peace, Seraphina struggles to protect her own secret, the secret behind her musical gift, one so terrible that its discovery could mean her very life.”

Seraphina is unlike any other fantasy novel I've read. Partly because I've never read about dragons and partly because it read so much like historical fiction, rather than a 'typical' fantasy.

For starters, the whole take on dragons was fantastic. I've never heard of anything like it in relation to dragons, or any other mythical or fantastical creature other than werewolves (which I'm not a big fan of, so I honestly wasn't expecting much). The whole idea of saarantrai was well executed, very unique and highly enjoyable.

That being said, I do feel that the world building could have been improved on. We're given all this information about a treaty between the dragons and the humans, all these different saints that are allocated to a child during their christening, not to mention all the different nationalities. Although there is a glossary and list of characters at the end of the book, I feel that these things could have been more explained throughout the story, if only to make understanding everything a little easier. A map of the area, as well as perhaps some illustrations or diagrams of dragons, would have been nice to see as well.

I was pleasantly surprised with the characters as well. Seraphina in particular. I was (more than) a little worried that this book would be overtaken by romance and that the whole fantasy element would be shoved aside in favour of appealing to young adults by means of lots of kissing and sappy lines. That was not the case at all. Phina was strong and smart, level-headed and quick-thinking. And though she did annoy me at times (mainly when she wouldn't tell people the truth about herself when - I felt that - the situation really called for it), I can overlook that. Orma and Glisselda were another two favourites of mine too, for very different reasons. I loved how Orma struggled with his emotions as the story progressed, and how there was more to Glisselda than first meets the eye. I really enjoyed the majority of the characters, but those three stuck out the most to me.

While that's all well and good, I couldn't help but feel a little let down by the plot (in much the same way as the world building was a little lacking). I feel that there wasn't really a direction until the middle of the story, and even though it's a fairly short book, parts did drag and it took me a lot longer to get through the first half than I expected. That being said, it really picked up towards the end and I did not see the twist coming! It was well done and very believable, and I feel that Hartman deliberately led you on to distrust certain characters and think that they were responsible for all the bad things that happened.

All in all, Seraphina is an interesting read with an equally interesting approach to the dragon myth. While there were a few faults, it's still highly deserving of its four star rating.